Mad Scientist Hall of Fame

Nominees: Conjecture 2010

Conjecture 2010 will see the second induction of members to the Mad Scientist Hall of Fame. In keeping with the convention theme of “The Future is Now”, all nominees for fictional characters for this election to the Mad Scientist Hall of Fame will be characters from the future!

Not having access to actual future historical documents, nominees for real life inductees into the hall of fame will be from the 20th or 21st century.

Nominations will still be taken at any time until the end of voting, though the earlier a nominee is included the better his chances.

Individuals can vote at any time. Membership in Conjecture is not a requirement for voting. An individual may vote for up to five (5) fictional characters and one (1) historic individual.

Dr. Mathias

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and psychic abilities. Experiments induced psychosis in at least some patients.

Source: Firefly and Serenity (2005)

Roger Korby

Medical Archeologist

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: “The Louis Pasteur” of medical archeology, Korby met his end due to exposure on the

planet Exo III, but his consciousness was transferred into an android body by the remnants of an robot civilization located

under the planet’s surface. The android Korby hatched a plan to introduce his android into Federation society through the

selective replacement of individuals with replicas, including Captain James Kirk of the Starship Enterprise.

Source: Star Trek

Real Life

Jack Parsons

Rocket Scientist

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Co-founder of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, he was credited by Werner Von Braun as the actual father of the

US space program. Parsons was also a avid devotee of the occult and a strict follower of the Thelema, a sort of spiritual philosophy on life led

by Aleister Crowley. He started invoking the name of the Greek god Pan before every rocket test. He participated in a ritual known as the

Babalon Working, an attempt to summon a living goddess, with L. Ron Hubbard.

Dr. Sidney Gottlieb

Chemist

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Poison expert for the CIA, tried to poison Castro via his cigars or by soaking his boots

in thallium. Headed the MKULTRA project, trying to use LSD for the purposes of mind control, experimenting first

on himself and his colleagues and then expanding experimentation to involve unwitting subjects.ead of the KM.K.

Guy Ben-Ary

Bio Artist

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Creates “living screens” made of cultured cells onto which to project movies.

Cultures tissues into South African worry-dolls. Created the MEART project, involving a robot arm for

drawing art which is controlled via the internet by a culture of rat cells in a lab. The cell culture’s art has

been changing lately, developing patterns and perhaps learning.

Note: Probably the only individual on this list who you can friend on facebook.

Dr. José Manuel Rodriguez Delgado

Physician, Professor

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Invented the Stimoceiver, a device for direct electrical stimulation of the brain to stimulate emotions and control

Behavior. This work started in cats then moved on to monkey and eventually humans, including mental patients. Once demonstrated a device by

Standing in front of a charging bull and stopping the charge with his device.

Dr. Sergei Bruyukhonenko

Physician

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Created the first heart/lung support devices that make so many transplants possible today. To demonstrate

their effectiveness, kept the severed heads of dogs alive, even demonstrating this before an audience in 1928. See the video here.

Wilhelm Reich

Psychiatrist

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Started as respected psychiatist working with Sigmund Freud and focusing on character structure

rather than individual neuroses. Later in life, broke psychiatric taboos against touching patients and worked with patients in their

underwear to improve their “orgastic potency”. Claimed to have discovered the existence of a universal, all-prevading life energy

called “orgone”. Orgone could coalesce to product organization on micro to macroscopic scales. Reich believed the energy could be

manipulated to many purposes including curing disease and controlling weather.

Dr. Duncan MacDougall

Surgeon

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Doctor MacDougall theorized that if the human soul existed it should have a physical presence

and therefore mass. To test this thesis, he modified an industrial beam scale and attached it to a hospital bed into which he

placed terminal patients. Upon their death, he looked for any change in mass which he believed he saw at a period of from

minutes to hours after death. He reached an average figure of about three-quarters of an ounce, later noted as 21 grams.

The doctor even conducted control experiments, including testing the change in his own weight with the expelling of breath

and the change of weight upon the death of presumably souless dogs. (He noted no change in either case.)

Dr. Vladimir Demikhov

Surgeon

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: Early pioneer in the field of organ transportation, Demikhov tested methods using dogs. His more unusual

Experiments involved the attachment of the heads of dogs or even the foreends of puppies onto the body of other living dogs.

J. B. S. Haldane

Genetist

Inventions/Projects/Schemes: A pioneering geneticist, he helped develop the mathematics of population genetics and natural selection. He

also co-developed a theory of enzyme mechanics. He was also a self-experimenter in less theoretical physiology work. As a boy, he helped his father

test gas masks, on themselves – his father eventually died of self-inflicted carbon monoxide poisoning. As an adult he experimented

with a barometric (pressure) chamber, inflicting it also on his wife and even an ex-prime minister of Spain. He suffered a crushed spine and perforated

ear-drums. “[T]he drum generally heals up; and if a hole remains in it, although one is somewhat deaf, one can blow tobacco smoke out of the ear in question,

which is a social accomplishment.”

War Criminals

The list of real world mad scientists above has certain intentional, glaring omissions, notably WWII’s Joseph Mengele (“The Angel of Death”) and Shiro Ishii (“The Father of Biological Warfare”) among other war criminals. While these individuals and their ilk certainly meet any set of criteria for mad scientists, they represent trouble that we really don’t need in his bit of silliness. All we need is to enshrine Joseph Mengele in our hall of fame and bring down the wrath of outraged groups such as the JDL. We’re just having a bit of fun here, folks.See previous Mad Science Hall of Fame winners HERE.